Leadership Challenge: Selecting Team Members - Essay Example

?Running head: leadership challenge: selecting team members 15th November Introduction In orderfor any firm to achieve its objectives, it is fundamental for managers to emulate effective policies that are all inclusive. Essentially, individuals at the management positions should act as leaders. Leadership entails providing guidance to team members with an aim of achieving preset objectives. While leaders are supposed to provide policies, they should seek the support of other team members since they are the ones in a good position to implement the policies. It is vital to note that during their day to day responsibilities, leaders make changes that would enhance their performance as well as the productivity of other employees. Such changes are not always acceptable to the employees or other managers. In this regard, a good leader should be in a position to address the challenges that arise from the organizational changes. One of the major ways of enhancing the productivity of the work force and increasing the profitability is by creating a culture of team work. Despite, the efforts by the CEO of one of my client organization to improve the performance of his firm, he is faced by resistance from some managers and employees. This paper seeks to analyze the situation and recommend the CEO on the steps to take. One of the major strategies that the CEO should emulate in order to effectively deal with the situation is to hold in-house meetings with his employees and educate them on the importance of team work. It is vital to note that some of the employees are not resisting the formation of teams not because they do want the idea but because they do not understand their relevance. One of the advantages of team work is that it results to the improved working relationship that enables employees to assist each other when faced with challenges. Additionally, team allows individuals to exercise their leadership qualities an aspect that provides them with opportunities to be promoted to senior level of management. The CEO should also engage with the employees during the formation of the team in order for each of the employee to feel comfortable. According to Nahavandi (2006), communicating with the employees and the managers is one of the initial strategies that the leader should adopt. In any organization, leading and managing are different aspects. While leading entails organizing the team members in order to attain the objectives of an organization, managing implies directing and giving instructions that should be strictly followed by the members of the team. Leading process is all inclusive where employees are free to provide their ideas to the leaders and the leaders can consult their team on certain issues. On the other hand, managing process does not allow for close intermingling between the managers and his or her teams. In his efforts to create a team-based empowered organization, the CEO is trying to lead his change initiative. As an experienced leader, he has noticed that there is lack of participation in the organization an aspect that other managers cannot detect. Contrary to the command and control style that other managers are adopting towards the employees, the CEO is focused at serving his customers effectively. In their studies on leadership in organizations Den and Koopman (2002), argues that a good leader should be focused at improving the productivity of his followers not by use of unquestionable instructions but by the use of all inclusive engagements with his followers. Based on the resistance that the mangers are providing, the CEO can use different arguments to preside the managers. The CEO should advise the managers to resist from using the dictatorial style of management. This is based on the fact that apart from limiting the productivity and growth of the employees, the firm will not effectively compete with other firms that have now turned into team works. Similarly, the CEO should encourage the managers to emulate team work based on the argument that in the contemporary business world, managers are evaluated on their ability to unite their workers and improve the performance of their teams and not on how well they give orders. To help the managers change their styles, the CEO should emulate democratic style of management. This implies that all the employees and the managers will now be part of the decision making process. Once the CEO emulates this style of leadership, the managers will gradually change their perception towards the employees. On their part, the employees will feel part and parcel of the change thus making them to support the CEO ideas (Tannenbaum and Schmidt, 1973). The CEO should also communicate with his managers and train them on the implications of teams in a work place and the benefits of motivating employees. The CEO actions and decision are more of a leader than a manager. One of the key implications of his actions is that employees will be motivated thus they will support the CEO in his responsibilities. Additionally, the managers will discover that their style of management is not the best and that by creating a team based organization, they will improve their management skills thus becoming competitive in their future assignments. As far as the customers are concerned, the CEO actions will leave them satisfied thus increasing the firm’s profitability. Likewise, the decision making process will be faster since everyone will be involved. My recommendation to the CEO is that he introduces a feedback system where employees will be given chances to contribute to the decision making process. The CEO should have a direct connection with the employees. In this way, the CEO will timely address all the issues and challenges faced by the employees in a timely manner. The CEO should come up with a team of for example 8-12 members. Additionally, he can make the managers to be the team leaders once he notices that the culture of team work has been adopted by all the stakeholders. In this way, he will be certain that the managers will not continue with their earlier style of management. To ensure that his team work approach is productive, the CEO should make a quarterly internal evaluation of the employees and the managers and incase of deviation he should hold discussion with his flowers to address such issues amicably. Conclusion Individuals at the management levels should seek to be leaders and not managers. This is based on the fact that leaders are role models of their followers and therefore they should always display the vices that they want their employees to emulate. Despite the challenges that leaders face while bringing changes within their organizations, it is always imperative to adopt communication as a way of addressing the issues. While good leadership leads to employee motivation, managing create gaps between the employee and the mangers. Such gaps are hindrance to expansion of an organization. Team works creates good relationship, improved performance, employees motivation and emergence of new ideas during the decision making process. References Den, N and Koopman, P. (2002). Leadership in organizations. London: Sage. Nahavandi, A. (2006). The art and science of leadership. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Tannenbaum, R., Schmidt, W. (1973). How to choose a leadership pattern. Harvard Business Review, May/June 1973. Read More